Such films reflect the nihilism that seems to be the dominant attitude in Hollywood.
A pedophile, an abortionist, a sicko sex researcher, a communist mass-murderer, euthanasia... Yep, that's hollywood. I have always loved the movies but hoooo, boy. Again it's the height of irony that "The Passion" is getting the silent treatment seeing as biblical epics were some of Tinseltown's most popular moneymakers--especially from "Quo Vadis" in '48 to "Greatest Story Ever Told" in '65. It just goes to show how twisted the cultural elite has become.
I have been reading Michael Medved's autobiography "Right Turn." The man's a real writer and his life and family history are emblematic of the American Dream. He was truly a witness to history in his youthful years. Among many other things, in his Yale days he knew John Kerry (a pompous ass whom no one could stand from the very beginning), Hillary Rodham (she was actually rather nice before she teamed up with Bill--her incoherent Wellesley address notwithstanding, Howie Dean and many others during his salad years of democrat political involvement and campaign work in the Roaring Sixties. In later chapters he goes into detail on the observations and events that soured him on the film industry's output and inspired him to write "Hollywood versus America" as well as bringing him to the conclusion that the movie moguls hate common decency and morality SO much that they would really, truly rather lose money (not their own) making ugly "R"-rated pictures (60% of films in the decade of the nineties) about vengeful ghosts, serial killers, perverts and alien monsters than anything smacking of "family values" and patriotism.
He devotes almost a full chapter to Hollywood's insulting defiance to the unprecedented outrage over the "Last Temptation of Christ" and his own shock and amazement when he saw for himself the unbelievably ugly, pointlessly blasphemous and incredibly boring 2 1/2-hour mess it turned out to be. His dawning realization that Scorsese knew beforehand it would be a despised flop and made it simply to get in with the in crowd was quite a revelation. He goes on in interesting detail as to how he rediscovered his religion, becoming more and more conservative and enduring the resultant slings and arrows he attracted as a conservative movie critic and radio talk show host. There is no better book I know of that explains so well why observant jews should not feel threatened by christianity here in America, the way his Ukranian jewish grandparents lived in dread of their village priest's anti-semitic incitements. Indeed, he makes it plain that evangelical christians are Israel's best friend and ally.
He finishes with a blow-by-blow account of his own involvement in the furore surrounding the "Passion" and the advice and encouragement he gave to Mel as he was doing the final editing. How he tried to counter the Pavlovian knee-jerk respons by liberal jewry. Quite often the very same people who hailed "Temptation" railed against the "Passion" and claimed it would set off a world-wide wave of pogroms. To say the least, this did not happen.
In my opinion the truly ground-breaking thing about "The Passion" was the WAY it was made and marketed. It was the biggest example so far of the growing globalization of the art of moviemaking. More needs to be written about that angle of the story because this is what has the studio suits really trembling. The picture was made completely outside the studio system with none of that bloated overhead to pay for. The work was contracted out on a piecework basis in a half-dozen countries for far, far less money than had it been made the traditional way. I once read a great article in Esquire nearly ten years ago about how Hollywood is really the world's most perfect welfare state with gargantuan amounts of deadwood, ponderous union work rules, creative accounting and people being paid astronomical sums for doing very little. This rice bowl is now directly threatened and not just by broadband piracy.
I thought "The Prince of Egypt" was pretty good too. That of course was Dreamworks. I gather Pixar has had the lock on family-friendly animation for a while now.
The grosses for 2004 actually set a record high. In regards to 'The Last Temptation of Christ', Medved's speculation about why Scorsese made the film is completely wrong. Scorsese had worked on a script as early as the 70s. A time when projects that outre were much more common. Because of financing continually falling through he had to wait till 1987-1988 to get it made. Scorsese considered going into the Priesthood as a young man. That movie had nothing to do with any in-crowd. It was the personal work of a troubled believer. The reason it failed commercially is that non-believers avoid religious themed films altogether. And the believers certainly weren't going to go.
Interesting, thanks for the ping to your post.
Wonderful paragraphs. Thanks tons.